14:32 1 June

After we finished eating – Mel let me try a bite of her reindeer dog, which I decided was ‘a bit spicy, not bad’ – we broke out the candy.

Kelly tossed a skittle about a foot or two in the air, and caught it in her mouth.

“Nice!” I said, in unexpected perfect harmony with Bay and Mel.

Kelly twitched and leaned away from us. “Whoa, uni-mind. Fuh-reaky.”

We laughed. “Sorry,” we all said, again in unison. Kelly made a cross at us with her forefingers.

After that we made a game of trying to land skittles in each other’s mouths (not that we were really keeping score – the winner was whoever got to eat the most). The majority of them ended up eaten, but we made enough of a mess that the ravens would be happy later. The rest of the candy followed in a more orderly fashion, and pretty soon we were packing up all our trash, and then picked up the shopping bags and headed over toward the playground area and found a trash can.

“Who wants ice cream?” someone called from an ice cream cart over by the roofed picnic tables. “Come and get it!”

My ears perked up. “Ice cream?” I said, and Kelly went “Ooh!”

We’d taken about four steps when Bay and Mel grabbed me and Kelly by the wrists and said, “They’re not talking to us, you dorks!”

“What? But she just said…” I looked over at the picnic tables and then noticed the large gathering, and the butcher-paper banner advertising the Miller Family Reunion Pre-Party 2009.

“Ah,” I said sheepishly, and Kelly went almost as red as I felt.

Our start, however, got us close enough to see one of the numerous kids screaming off the playground equipment tumble and fall off the ‘upper deck’ of the ‘ship’, landing on his arm with a snap I could almost hear from where I stood. That started an entirely different kind of screaming.

“Oh my god,” at least one of us said, and we started that way instinctively.

A lady in her 20s was trying to rock a baby in her arms and looked torn between following the rest of the Miller family over to the injured kid and staying where she was; her panicked survey of the area caught sight of us and she ran our way instead.

“Girls! Thank God, here- one of you, change her!”

She shoved the baby into Bailey’s arms and ran, and Bay immediately passed her to Kelly, who handed her to me like we were playing hot potato, leaving me stunned and with an unexpected baby wailing in my ears.

Not something I’d thought would happen to me before I’d even started dating.

Jeepers, okay, c’mon Jack, you got this, you took that Safe Sitter course when the neighbors wanted you to watch their kid. Or, wait, was that when I was 14? Yeah, so either I dreamed up a safe sitter course or I’m 13 years out of practice. Crap, am I certified for this? Why me??

I looked at my so-called friends, all of whom were staring back at me and the crying baby, totally bewildered.

“What, none of you ever babysit before?”

They all shook their heads.

“Rich,” Kelly pointed out.

“I always spend my summers with you,” Bailey reminded me.

“Like, five-year olds, yeah!” Mel defended.

I rolled my eyes. “Great. Alright, Bay, get that diaper bag over by the picnic table, I think it’s the right one. I- gah! Quit it!” I yelped, as the baby grabbed my hair and yanked. “Mel, help me pull my hair back. Kelly, either make some silly faces to distract the baby, or cover my mouth while I swear.”

Bailey dove into the frantic mass, while Kelly’s eyebrows scrunched together in confusion.

“It’s- ow!- cathartic.”

Mel worked my hair out of the baby’s fist, while Kelly did fun things with her face, or at least attention-grabbing things judging by the baby’s astonished look. It didn’t seem especially captivating to me, but then, I had a lot more experience having eyes.

“Here!” Bailey said, holding the diaper bag up triumphantly and looking like she’d just swum out of a mosh pit. “Now what?”

I glanced over at the picnic table area, which was currently a madhouse of panic and amateur medical attention.

“Uhh, does the women’s bathroom have a changing table in it?” I asked, with a glance in the other direction at the park’s enclosed public bathrooms. I knew the men’s didn’t, which seemed like an oversight.

“I think so,” Kelly said, nodding.

“Great.” The baby – I needed to call her something for convenience; uhhhh… Elora works – was starting to cry again, and she definitely needed changed, so I headed that way and the others followed.

The women’s bathroom was empty, and actually pretty clean for a public bathroom. One wall was taken up by stalls, all of which even still had doors attached. I theoretically understood the point of a urinal, but I did not understand how, or perhaps a better word would be why, anyone actually used one. From my brief glance, the women’s bathroom made a lot more sense.

Bailey helpfully flipped down the changing table, and I started getting things sorted. The girls were all crowding around me pretty intently, and someone’s chin was digging into my collarbone.

“Why are you all trying to climb over my shoulders?” I complained over the ringing echo of Elora’s annoyance. “It’s not like I’m defusing a bomb.”

“Pee-yew!” Kelly said, holding her nose. “No kidding!”

“Can someone please keep an eye out the door in case the lady wants her kid back?”

“Yeah hang on who the heck just gives a random girl her baby?” Bailey said, holding the door open with her heel while she kept watch.

“She did kinda have something going on,” Mel said.

“Sure, but wasn’t there anyone free that she knew? Like, say, a family member?”

I mostly tuned them out while I cleaned Elora up and got rid of the evidence, then buttoned her onesie back up – it had Minnie Mouse on it, she was pretty darn cute other than the screaming – then passed the diaper bag back to Bailey and scooped Elora up again so we could go somewhere with slightly less reverberation.

“Oh thank god,” Kelly said as soon as we were back outside. I had to agree.

Elora still seemed pretty upset – I guess I could sympathize, all that screaming around her and then getting handed off to four kids she didn’t know – but my ears were starting to hurt so I did the only thing I could think of. When she paused for breath, I booped her in the nose and said,

“You remind me of the babe.”

“What…” Bay started, and then got it and smiled “-babe?”

“The babe with the power,” I went on, tickling Elora’s tummy. She cut off the screaming at least, and looked confused at us instead.

“What power?” Kelly prompted.

“The power of voodoo!”

“Do what?” Mel asking, grinning.

“Remind me of the babe!” we all said at once at the same time, and Elora squealed excitedly. Which wasn’t exactly the change I was hoping for from screaming, but at least she seemed happier, with a big smile for such a little face.

“I saw my baby, cryin’ hard as babe could cry- what could I do?” I crooned, tickling her tummy again. The girls joined in, and Elora started giggling.

By the end of the song, with me gently rocking her (rather than dancing around with a swarm of goblins – well, debatable), she’d fallen asleep in my arms sucking on a pacifier, and we all sat down on one of the benches.

“Wow, my own cousin, a teen mom,” Mel teased quietly.

“Shut up,” I said, feeling my face get hot.

“Don’t worry,” Kelly said, elbowing Mel and holding up her phone. “I got pictures.”

I stuck my tongue out at her.

“I think Jack looks sweet,” Bailey said.

“Thank you.”

“All maternal like that.”

“Nyeh,” I told her. Maternal, pssh- I’m thirteen, I’m way too young to be a mom! Dad. Whatever.

Elora was a very cute baby though, so I thought I could live with it.

The moment couldn’t last; among the various people trickling past to see what was going on over in the Situation, was one I had been hoping not to see again today. Zack was moseying toward us, with a slushie in one hand from the gas station next to the park, and a burger in the other from Wendys next to the gas station. I ducked my head down and tried to hide behind my hair – it didn’t work well, since Mel had put it in a ponytail – as he crunched along the gravel path toward us. I could feel Bay and Mel tense up on either side of me. Then the footsteps stopped.

“What the- Slattery?” Zack yelled.

Elora hiccupped and woke up, and we all glared at him and said,

“Sshsh!”

“S-sorry!” he said, looking briefly stunned. Then he got a good look at Mel and me and shook it off, squinting at us.

“Hi, I’m Melody Cook,” Mel spoke up, while I got the baby to stay calm. “Jack Slattery’s my cousin, you know him?”

Zack’s suspicious gaze moved to me.

“I’m, uh, her sister!” I lied, pointing at Mel with my free hand.

“Yeah, uh, this is my sister, uh,” Mel stammered.

“Symphony!” Kelly blurted. I nodded, possibly a little bit frantically, pointing at Kelly.

“Yeah, Symphony Cook! Uh, also Jack’s cousin.”

Zack squinted at us for a couple moments longer, while his braincells staggered around looking for each other to attempt a thought, then he eventually shrugged, shook his head, and lumbered away toward the playground. All four of us sighed in relief, roughly in unison. While Elora blew some bubbles, we took a blessed moment of silence to reflect on how nice it was to be alive – or, well, I did anyway, I couldn’t be sure of anyone else since my attempts at telepathy were so far unsuccessful.

Then I turned to give Kelly my most perplexed glare.

“Symphony??”

Mel and Bailey burst out laughing, while Kelly groaned and put her face in her hands.

“I panicked,” she defended, slightly muffled. “I didn’t see you coming up with anything.”

“Yeah, well, if I told him my name was Jay and I just happened to look exactly like ‘my cousin Jack’, I think even he might’ve figured it out.”

“Aww,” Bailey got out, “you mean I can’t call you Sym?”

“No!”

Me yelling scared Elora, which earned me a punch in the arm from Mel, but we goofed around and got her to fall asleep again – then goofed around more quietly – and eventually things calmed down over in the Situation and Elora’s mom, looking very harried, came over to us.

“Phew, thank you girls, you’re life savers…” she trailed off as she looked at Bailey. “You are not Connie.”

“Uh, no ma’am?”

She looked at us, down at Elora, back at me.

“…I don’t know any of you.”

We all stared at each other for a moment.

“Thanks for not kidnapping my daughter,” she finally said.

I held out the baby.

###

16:02 1 June

At that point I was very relieved when Kelly’s mom texted her she was free again, and showed up to pick us up. Then it was a short trip to Kelly’s house, where we unloaded our instruments and headed for the practice room.

“Y’think we should consider earplugs?” Bailey said.

“What?” I said, cupping a hand behind my ear.

“I said- psh, you dork.”

“I’m only half-joking,” I admitted, “that baby could really project.”

Kelly did actually have some of those foam earplugs – and a set of fancy drummer’s headphones she refused to share – so, with our hearing protected, I pulled out the sheets I’d printed for today’s practice. I had Age of Consent and American Idiot on top this time, and, after starting up a cassette recorder Kelly said her dad had found her, we really got into it. The bassline for Age of Consent was one of my favorite song intros, and as we started putting it together I swung my hips and shimmied a bit while I waited to come in on guitar; I could feel the smile busting across my face as I did. God, this was fantastic.

“Won’t you- please let me go…”

After our first good run-through, we stopped and played the recording. Kelly laughed, looking as giddy as I felt. “Holy shit! Did we get better?”

“Don’t know, don’t care!” Bay said. “Worth it anyway.”

“Whoever invented the electric bass,” I said, “I want to kiss them on the lips.”

“You mean Paul Tutmarc?” Mel said, like it was a thing anybody would know.

“I guess so.” I scrunched up my nose a little. “Yeah, I can make an exception.”

We got the recorder set up again, and after a bit more refining and fiddling, moved on to American Idiot. These vocals are gonna be fun! Especially with my singing voice. The way I’d worked it up had made Age of Consent sound pretty cool, but with the style I was emulating, this song – plus, I thought, maybe a bit of crunch when we started experimenting – was totally made for it.

I was definitely right; after we got the basics down, we pulled a bit of the pop out and stuck in the synth to back my hoarser shoutier vocals. Or maybe punk music just sounds better sung by someone who sounds like a girl. We spent about an hour and a half on the two songs, before we broke for hydration.

We were all leaning against various kitchen counters watching the teakettle heat up when Bailey spoke up.

“So, I was thinking. I know we haven’t heard back from Ms. Stevens yet, but… what if we each try and write a song we can play if the gig works out?”

“Yes!” Mel and I said immediately.

“Man, stop that!” Kelly said. “But yes.”

“Cool!”

“Y’know, on that subject… do we know anyone with a good digital video camera?” I’d been considering an idea for a while now, and now seemed as good a time as any to start working on an online presence.

“Mmmaybe,” Bailey said. “What are you thinking?”

“Well, if we videoed our practices, we might be able to put some of it on YouTube. Get the word out, and we might even draw in a few extra people when we play for real.”

I was downplaying the potential of internet word-of-mouth a little, but we were just kids, and YouTube was… still a bit sparse. But the girls seemed to like the idea anyway, so we high-fived and Bay promised to ask her mom to borrow the camera.

We heated up some pizza rolls then gave it another hour just jamming (and threw in a Teen Age Riot and a Hex Girl for fun), until Kelly’s mom had to take us home.

###

19:00 1 June

Mel and I got out of the SUV, pulled various electronics, musical equipment, and shopping bags out of the back, and waved as they went on their way to Bailey’s house. The lights were on at home, and I glanced into the garage.

“Cool, Mom and Dad are both home! Think they made us dinner?”

“Jack!” Mel hissed. “Pants!”

“Huh? Ahshit!” Pants: I was not wearing any.

“What do we do?” Mel asked, yanking me around the corner of the house.

“Ohhhh, boy, uh, up the wall, go in the window?” I spitballed.

“One, how, two, I think they’d notice.”

“Crap, you’re right.” I looked at her. Realized something. “Gimme your jeans, quick!”

“What- no! Ggh, here.” She dug into her shopping bag and pulled out some sort of mid-calf-length black cargo pants. “Just put them on and then take the skirt off.”

“See, this is why you’re the older one,” I said, doing that. “I would absolutely have stood here in my underwear before I thought of that.”

“Sorta like how you’re standing in front of the window?”

“Yah!” I spun to check and saw nothing but siding. “Hey!”

“Gotcha!” she crowed.

I chucked my skirt at her head.

###

After that, Mel and I spent the better part of a week just the two of us, or us and Bailey – bizarrely, Kelly had other things she had to do some of the time. Rude.

Oh wait does she have other friends? It occurred to me that while I currently had the largest number of friends I’d ever had, other people might have more than five.

Anyhow, we couldn’t keep getting my parents to drive me places, and Bailey’s mom was busy selling real estate, so we just watched movies and TV, or worked on writing our songs, or jumped on the trampoline, or reminisced about the time when we were five or so and spent three days living inside a refrigerator box in the backyard pretending we’d been raised by raccoons. (Good times).

That last one might have been a less than universal experience.

Other than that, Mel and I did get a chance on Friday to find a couple of things for Andrew, and pretty soon it was Saturday and time for his party.

At the roller rink.

This can only go well.